Mustafa al-Barzani, (born March 14, 1903, Barzān, Iraq—died March 1, 1979, Washington, D.C., U.S.) Kurdish military leader who for 50 years strove to create an independent nation for the millions of Kurds living on the borders of Iran, Iraq, and the Soviet Union.

The son of a landlord, Barzani succeeded his elder brother, Sheikh Ahmed, who led the Kurdish national struggle from World War I until the late 1930s. In 1946 Barzani emerged as commander of the army of the short-lived Kurdish Mahabad Republic, which had been established with Soviet aid in northwestern Iran. He also founded the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), which was to remain the most powerful group in Kurdish politics for decades.

After the Soviet forces withdrew in 1947, the Mahabad Republic was overrun by Iran’s army, and Barzani took refuge in Soviet Azerbaijan, where he remained until he was allowed to return to Iraq after that country’s 1958 revolution. Barzani rejected the Iraqi government’s subsequent offer of autonomy for the Kurdish area in northern Iraq, and in 1960 he escaped to the mountains and started a guerrilla war against the Iraqi forces. After 10 years of intermittent fighting, a cease-fire agreement was reached, followed by a general amnesty for the insurgent Kurds, and in 1974 a law defining the Kurdish autonomous region was promulgated by Iraq. Barzani found this compromise unacceptable and ordered his Peshmerga (“Forward to Death”) Kurdish forces to resume fighting, this time with considerable support from Iran. When Iranian support ended in 1975, the Kurdish guerrillas were overrun by the Iraqi forces. Barzani took up residence in Tehrān but then requested asylum in the United States, where he died. His remains were returned to his birthplace for burial.

After his death Barzani was succeeded as leader of the KDP by his son, Masoud. Masoud became the president of the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq in 2005.

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